"James?" Paul said as he noticed his friend once again a fox woman. "What's going on?"
"I..." James said as she looked down at her hands. Her vision blurred and then sharpened. The sounds of the surrounding city blasted into her ears. Her entire body tingled, and then she blurred at the edges momentarily before growing solid once again. She tried to say more, but the world was wobbling quite dangerously.
The room spun around her, making her dizzy as she grasped for anything solid. But the world just blurred faster and faster around her. Then, quite unexpectedly, the floor threw itself at her and slammed itself into her face.
As she lay there on the floor, gravity had gotten the best of her, being the cruel mistress it was. Her vision blurred around the edges, and she could only wonder what she did to make the ground so mad at her that it decided to attack. With that final thought, she passed out.
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James hummed happily to herself. It was a catchy tune her father liked to play on his flute. She sat at a table in front of the window into the garden. The early morning sun shone in and warmed her. In the distance, vibrant trees in splotches of blues, greens, and purples spiraled up from the ground as they did in the wisping woods.
Her hands moved carefully and delicately snipped the stem of a flower before neatly placing it in the vase beside a dozen others in pinks, yellows, and purples. The mix of scents from the flowers was sweet on her nose, and she couldn't help but smell the arrangement.
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James stepped through the door into the elder's small cottage. The interior was cluttered with all kinds of little knickknacks and smelled of rosewood incense. The elder, an older woman whose ears drooped with age, sat in a rocking chair within.
"Oh, there you are @Q#$T%@," the woman said as she gave a warm smile to James, who had carefully removed her shoes at the door of the tiny home. "I wasn't sure if I would see you this week."
James smiled and moved over to the table in front of the woman, which held a vase of drooping flowers. "Elder, I would never neglect visiting you," James said as she replaced the flowers in the vase with the ones she had prepared earlier.
"Oh dear, I know how busy you've gotten. Tending your mother's medicinal garden, and you're even helping your father with his dyes." The elder said, eyeing James's brightly colored cloak.
James blushed slightly as she recalled her indulgence. "It is as you say, elder, but I am not quite ready to give up hearing your stories."
"Ah, it's nice to hear these old bones still have a use," the elder said as she gestured to the teapot on the table. "Please help yourself. It's cooled slightly, but it's your favorite."
James nodded as she poured herself a drink and settled in for the elder to begin her story.
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James was roughly pulled up from the wagon she had been sitting on and thrown in the mud. The group of other Kitsen shied back from the Koro, who jeered at them before turning and slamming the gates to their prison closed.
James crawled toward the group who helped her up, and she stared back at the armored warriors who had kidnapped her and destroyed her village.
Her ears focused on them as an important one stepped out of a nearby tent and addressed the others with a croak, "How many more in this group?"
"Just one," the lead warrior said. "The pickings from this area are growing slim."
"It's a border region. There will be more," the important Koro said. "Get them ready to ship back."
"Yes, Taisho," the warriors clamored before they set about various tasks.
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"Focus," said her mentor. It was an older gray-haired man with an eyepatch covering his left eye. He was missing most of his left ear and sported a large scar across that side of his face.
James looked down at her hands and tried to make anything happen, but she was left with nothing.
"Like this," her mentor said as the sclera of his remaining eye turned black. Above his right hand, a tiny wisp of orange light floated briefly before he closed his fingers, dousing the light.
"I don't understand," James admitted. "I can't do it."
"You can, and you must. For now, go help the others. I need to rest," he said in a weary voice, looking winded from the slight exertion.
James bowed slightly, just a small one, before she moved back towards the tent with the sick and wounded. She couldn't be seen being too formal lest the Koro decide to remove her or her mentor.
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James coughed heavily as she shivered in her soiled robe. She had long since gotten accustomed to the small part of the camp. Autumn had already fallen, and she would take any warmth she could get.
It had been months since she had been taken, and she wasn't doing well. But none of them were. They had only basic roofs and limited and slimy food. They sat outside and were not provided any clothing beyond what they had when they arrived.
The few escape attempts that had been made had gone poorly. The Koro were known for their solid blades and piercing water magic.
She had learned what she could before her mentor passed. She just wished she had learned faster.
She rested against the fence next to the gate, waiting for the perfect moment. Eventually, they would look away, get distracted, and forget if they had closed it for some reason. At that moment, she would conjure an illusion of a closed gate. But she had to be certain, as she would only get one chance.
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The small group of haggard survivors trudged onward. Everyone was tired, and none of them had any food.
James never thought she would be dodging military patrols or doing anything like this. Her life had been upended for no reason, but at least there was hope, as slim as it was.
"I hear something," %#$%@^ whispered from beside her, his ears swiveling. "We need to hide."
James simply nodded as the group moved into a small copse of trees. They had learned early on that roads were a death sentence. But even out in the deep, Koro scouting parties roamed around. Most weren't looking for escaped prisoners, but that meant little.
James focused as the others huddled around her, and she pushed her magic outward to cover them all, hiding them against the trees. It wasn't perfect, and a few scouting parties had seen through her illusion, but it was all they had.
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James sat up, groggy from sleep, and looked around. What had that sound been? She wasn't sure...
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The group of Koro grinned as they cornered her...
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... ... ...
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James slowly opened her eyes and found a blurry world of blurry objects. The room was quiet, and the lights were dim. She smelled distant hints of rubbing alcohol. She closed her eyes again as sleep claimed her once more.
Time vanished in a blur of hazy sleep as she came too once more. A throbbing headache pounded against the inside of her skull, but the shapes of the room gained some focus. She didn't recognize it. Was it a hospital room? Was she sick?
James tried to say something, but her throat was dry, and only a hoarse wheeze came out. She tried to sit up but found she had little strength to do so.
Still, after a few minutes, she managed to regain some semblance of control over herself and found a bottle of water on a stand next to her bed. "Mountain spring water" was helpfully printed on the label, featuring an idyllic mountain scene.
Her headache had subsided somewhat, and instead, it felt like her head had been stuffed full of cotton, and she was having trouble focusing. Still, she moved to get the bottle and noticed that something was pressed into her arm. She looked back to realize it was an IV of some sort. What was going on? Why was she here?
She decided to save those problems for later. Just as she managed to grab the bottle and unscrew the lid, the room's lights flipped on, and an older man walked in.
"Ah, you're awake," he said, looking at her. Noticing the bottle in her hands, added, "And lucid from all appearances."
James ignored the man and instead took a drink. The water soothed her cracked throat but caused her to cough.
"I had my doubts, of course," he said as he checked the bag on the IV stand. "We don't often treat monsters."
"Not a monster," James managed to rumble.
"Oh, I believe it," the man said as he checked a device on the wall. "Your vitals, well, they exist." He then turned to look at James. "I am Doctor Forest. How are you feeling?"
"Like shit."